


Rest Bite

by LeighJ



Category: The Punisher (TV 2017)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Eventual Smut, F/M, Fluff and Smut, Fluff without Plot, Kissing, Late Night Conversations, Late at Night, Light Angst, Mild Smut, Neck Kissing, No Plot/Plotless, Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, Porn with Feelings, Rough Kissing, Sex, Smut, Strangers, Strangers to Lovers, Suggestions of supernatural elements, Supernatural Elements, Vaginal Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-05
Updated: 2019-05-05
Packaged: 2020-02-26 13:01:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,589
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18717598
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LeighJ/pseuds/LeighJ
Summary: Maya Jenkins has a relatively boring life running her fathers trailer park. Until Frank Castle rolls through the gates.





	Rest Bite

**Author's Note:**

> Binge watched The Punisher, fell in love with Frank Castle and here we are. I haven't watched Dare Devil, so you can take guesses as to where this would fall into Frank's timeline. I couldn't get this out of my head, so I had to write it. Hope you like!

There's not a lot at twenty six years old that Maya Jenkins has actually gotten done with her life. Staring out of the rain streaked windows, peering into the dark beyond it, she finds herself having one of those moments. Those moments where people look back on all their shitty mistakes, all their choices they didn’t make, all their regrets. Maya throws her mind back ten years ago, way back to when she was sixteen, thinking about college and moving out, about all those plans she had. All those ideas for her life. All those notions she wanted to live by. Expect ten years later, and right here and now she's still in her old man’s trailer park.

Running his shit for him while he drinks himself to death on cheap whiskey. Paying his bills, keeping his lights on. She’s not sure why, he’s too out of it most of the time to even notice the passage of time. The weeks that roll by, the years. Maya scoffs to herself, scratching at the surface of her office desk, bent to lean on her elbows. The years she’s wasted here. Still in the state she grew up in, still around the same childhood friends she's kept for life. Still working towards a fanciful idea that one day she'll get out. One day she'll be free. Maybe that's why she's so drawn to this place, she thinks glumly as her eyes take in the same old surroundings.

Maybe watching all the travellers come and go, all those faces that stay familiar as long as a week, or as soon as a night, before disappearing from her life forever, is the one and only thing that keeps her going. Keeps her walking into this little office day in and out, keeps her sedated in this boring life. Taking a glance around, Maya takes note of its insides, just to force the slow night to go faster. Plants limp in their chipped white pots, beige leather sofa pushed against the window, the fluorescent lighting that can be spotted right down by the entry gates, and the booth there where her cousin Tommy sits in a scrappy old seat, reading comics, no doubt.

Back here in her tiny office come reception space, there’s a blank TV on the wall and a dull mirror. The most exciting part of the room is the glass windows and door, and maybe the vending machines that dispense packs of cigarettes and single beers. Maya’s chipped fingernails tap against her desk top, eyes looking at the clock on her phone. It’s barely ten in the evening, so she’s got another six hours of her shift to go. No point clock watching now. Sighing, she admits defeat and pushes away from her desk, heading to the cigarette vending machine. Just as she pulls some crumpled bills from her back pocket, the radio crackles to life.

“Don’t even think about it. You’re two days strong, cuz.” Tommy’s voice cuts over the room.

Maya rolls her eyes and heads back to her desk. It’s creepy as hell that the lights are so damn bright in here, Tommy can see her every move from the bottom of the park. It’s a reminder that every stranger that rolls their cars or RV’s in here can see her all the way up the drive.

“Y’ain’t got time anyway. New guy comin’ up, alone. Wants a night. Says he'll stay in his car if we ain't got nothin’.” Tommy’s voice vibrates through the shitty box intercom, sending shock waves of bass through Maya’s desk just as she reaches it.

Picking up the attached radio, she presses down on the side button. “Keep up the good work, Tommy,” Maya teases, and releases the button on the side.

Her eyes track across her tiny, old TV screen on her desk, hosting grainy, black and white images from her security cameras littered up the drive and above the front door.

“Someone's gotta keep the bad guys out. Am I right?” Tommy hollers back, his voice full of static. “He's nearly there. Lemme know if you need me.”

Quick press of her thumb to the button to answer, “will do.” Then she releases and puts the little attachment back down.

She most certainly will not do, but Tommy likes to pretend he's some bigger, better hero than the shotgun she's got under her desk so Maya lets him have it. The grainy security feeds aren't showing her much, expect for a beat up car heading deeper into the park with a mysterious shadow in the front seat. Even when he exits his clunker of a car, the stranger keeps his head down low, baseball cap and hood added aids of disguise. From the minute she sees him, Maya knows he's a man who doesn't _want_ to be seen. Now it's not like she hasn't come across some criminal types out here in the middle of nowhere, operating a trailer park.

She's not as thick as her big, dark eyes lead people to believe. She has a policy though, an instinct she relies on for these kinds of mysterious people. Maya will know if she should hit her panic button; usually knows if she should buzz through to Tommy to call the cops. So she lets the new guy lean against his car for the moment, despite the drizzling rain. As she watches, she has a feeling that he's trying to catch his breath, or find his own precious seconds of peace and quiet. When he finally turns to face the little office she resides in, she has to quickly look away again. Just so he doesn't know she was staring at him hard enough to burn holes through his hood.

There's a few seconds where she doesn't look back up for fear she'll be caught staring, so she flips through her book of slots, fingers sliding through the crumbled pages. They have a few RVs to rent out but most folk turn up with their own, just looking for spaces to park. From what Tommy said, this guy wants to stay anyway. Which mainly tells Maya that desperation, or exhaustion is making a man who doesn't stop going, come to a halt. A man who doesn’t want to be seen, forced out into the open, out of the shadows. Maya shudders, fingers sliding down the page for any open slots to offer this man she already feels she knows.

Chewing on her bottom lip, she finally braves looking up. “Holy shit!” She screeches, stumbling back from her desk.

The guy she stopped watching for no more than twenty seconds, has moved from his car, silently through the door and right up to the counter. “Didn't mean to scare you, Ma'am,” the stranger mutters from under his hood. “Just lookin' for something to rent.”

Even with her heart rabbiting against her chest, Maya doesn’t find she’s particularly scared of him. That instinct of hers, it’s only failed her once and over the millions of times it’s worked out for her, she has to believe she hasn’t lost her touch. Clearing her throat, she rolls her shoulders out and steps back in front of her desk.

Despite giving this stranger the benefit of the doubt, she doesn’t sit down on her chair. “We have an’ RV goin’ near the back.” Flicking her eyes up beneath her long, dark hair, she tries to find the man’s eyes under his damp hood. “S’not pretty but it’ll do if you’re desperate.”

_Which I know you are._

The man lifts his head a little more, skull twitching around just slightly enough to give Maya the impression that he’s glancing around for security cameras. Of course there are some in here, and even though she has the feeling he knows that, he takes his hood down, leaving the baseball cap as his only protection. Even still she can see a bit more of him, judge him a little better. A nose that dominates his face, definitely broken once or twice. A few healing cuts and scrapes across his cheeks and forehead. They look like that of a road rash, suggesting a car crash. Bow lips, not quite thick but something appealing none the less; dark, wary eyes, lashes littered with raindrops like diamonds.

Maya blinks herself out of her cloudy thoughts. This is her thing. Her weird thing. Her feelings, her instincts, the guesses she tends to get right. Tommy likes to crab on about her having superpowers, because the kid reads too many comics. Thing is, there’s things in this world now that ain’t quite normal, not human sometimes. She wonders every now and then.

She definitely wonders.

The guy clears his throat and jerks his head. “Sounds good. I’ll take it, Ma’am.”

“Maya,” she interjects for no reason she can determine. “An’ you?” When he stares at her blankly, she adds quickly, “for the reservation.”

“Castiglione. Pete. How much y’want for that?” Pete grunts.

Maya blanks on the price for the moment because she has the overwhelming belief that he’s just lied to her. Pete doesn’t fit his hard face, his large frame, his big hands opening and closing at his sides. His long legs. None of that fits this name he’s proffered but that’s the thing about these intuitions, they’re not things she can say aloud without sounding bat-shit crazy.

“Um, sorry,” she clears her throat and blinks back into focus. “Eighty dollars.”

Pete scoffs and slightly shakes his head. “Jesus.”

She laughs at his reaction. “Yeah, I get that a lot, F-“ Maya cuts herself off quickly. “Lemme just write you in.” She hastens to add, picking up her pen and laying it to the page.

“What’s that you were gonna say, huh?” Pete asks, leaning into the counter.

Glancing up under her lashes, her pulse throbs a little. “S-sorry, I nearly called you the wrong name. Let me just write you in, _Pete_.”

“Come on,” Pete scoffs, his hand landing on the counter. The sound of his palm ringing off the surface makes her jump. “Y’know who I am?” He asks with a raised voice, his hand reaching to pull his cap off. “You know me?”

In that moment that Maya looks at him, watching him strip the cap from his head and showcase his military haircut, she does know him. She thought it was her weird thing, her intuition, but its news coverage that flashes through her mind now. This man in an orange jumpsuit. Then again, in a bullet proof vest painted with a white skull, though that last image feels like it come from _her._

Well she’s fucked the sale so she might as well throw in the towel. “Yeah, Frank. I watch the news. You got a pretty important face, y’know?”

Frank’s eye squints, his head cocked to the side with his body, like he’s half ready to run back out the door. “You gonna call the cops, that it?”

Surprising herself, she rolls her shoulder. “You gonna give me a reason to?”

Scoffing, he pushes into the counter again, bringing himself as close as he can. “Maybe ‘cause I got such an’ important face, huh?”

Maya nods nonchalantly, as if her heart isn’t racing.  “Lot of people around who agree with what you did.”

“Please,” Frank scoffs again. “Spare me the sentimental bullshit. I didn’t do shit to be some, some…” he stops to wind his hand around in front of his face, clearly agitated. “Some goddamn guidin’ light to you people.”

“Us people?” Maya repeats with her own scoff, cocking her jean clad hip and placing her hand on it. “Y’mean us small people, right?”

“Look, lady. I got places to be, I need a goddamn meal an’ somewhere to lay my head. You gonna give me that?” Frank asks hotly, voice low and urgent.

Nodding her head, she slaps her palms down on the counter. “Eighty dollars, like I said.”

“Eighty fuckin’ dollars,” he mutters as he digs in his back pocket and then slams the money on the counter. “Keep the change.”

“For my silence?” She asks with an eye roll. “Just don’t do nothin’ that means I gotta clean up after you, ‘kay?”

Laughing, Frank takes the keys she hands him after taking them off the wall, and starts to walk away. After a moment, he pauses and turns back to look at her. “You really recognise me off the TV, Maya?”

A shiver she can’t explain rolls through her body at his rough voice scraping her name through his throat. “Yeah. Where else would I know you from?”

He shrugs, glancing out the window and back again, his hand on the door. “Seems like you knew me the minute I got in here. Watched me all the way up, right?”

Swallowing, she scratches at the counter again, unable to hold his eyes. “Gotta keep my guard up. Woman alone this time of night. Trailer park.” She shrugs casually and looks up at Frank under the bright, unforgiving lights. “All sorts of trash rolls up.”

Pursing his lips, he laughs and pulls the door open, disappearing into the night before he appears again popping open his car door. Maya watches him drive down the left path towards where his bed for the night is waiting. When she can no longer see his car, she collapses against the counter and lets out a deep breath. Jesus Christ, what was she thinking? She just let The Punisher, Frank Castle go and stay in one of her RV’s, in her trailer park, without alerting the cops or Tommy. Without even considering it. Didn’t hesitate to write in his fake name, to change a digit on his license number just in case.

Maybe she really is crazy or maybe she’s so bored in this tiny life of hers, that seeing a man like Frank Castle is the most exciting thing she could see for the next ten years. A part of her wants him to come back, wants the opportunity to talk to him again. Having a conversation with him was like a minefield, but like the adrenaline junkie she seems to be, it excites her. The thing is, he doesn’t come back and at four in the morning, her shift comes to an end and the new girl, Fiona takes over for her. When she makes her way back with blearily eyes to hers and her old man’s trailer, she sees Frank Castle leaving his RV.

The way he walks, with purpose and determination, tells her that he’s ready for whatever he has planned. Refreshed, revived, full of restless energy. A duffel is slung over his back, which he throws into his car. Maya resists the urge to stop and watch him, instead continuing her path home in the bruised dawn light, the edges of the sky purple and pink. He drives past her and she almost thinks he’ll stop. A part of her believes he was planning to but changed his mind, moving his foot away from the brake and driving on by. It’s stupid that she feels a stab of disappointment, though it’s not something she’s unfamiliar with whenever her eyes land on her trailer. Knowing she’ll go in and it’ll stink of booze, and sad old man.

Sighing, Maya heads up the steps for a shower and some sleep.

* * *

The next night, she’s on the same shift after spending the day cleaning down one of the trailers. Its occupants were a young couple who liked smoking pot and leaving the baggies behind. They liked fucking too because they left a single condom in a pack of ten. Nine times in one night. Maya had scoffed at that, slightly impressed. Those young days are gone for her, though the truth is she never felt young anyway. Always felt ahead of her time. Ahead of everyone else. An old soul, her mother would call her when she was alive, when things were good. The scar long healed on her hip twinges, and she rubs it with a scowl that distracts her from Frank Castle walking through the door.

When she looks at him, she can’t stop the words from coming out. “You weren’t gonna come back here. You only stay one place once.”

“Yeah,” Frank drawls, letting the door shut behind him. “You’re a strange woman, you know that?”

Flushing, she lashes back, “I’m right, though. Why’d you come back?”

“’Cause you’re a very strange woman, an’ you got beer.” He flicks his finger to the vending machines along the far wall. “An’ I? Could really use a beer. An’ a bed. You got one for me, Maya?” He asks with a tense jaw and a slight tilt of his head.

He looks so comfortable, elbow resting on the counter, hand wrapped around his forearm. All confidence and bluster, but Maya feels the things coming off of Frank Castle’s skin. The unforgiving need to move, to be doing, to not be still. The restless, whirlwind energy that can snap a man’s neck and fuck a woman hard.

Startling herself, she clears her throat, her heart a roaring beat against her rib cage. “There’s a nicer RV near front that got vacated earlier today. Cost you though.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Frank mutters, rifling in his back pocket as he did last night and producing a fistful of bills. “Good enough?” He snarks as he litters the counter with them.

“Perfect.” Maya smirks.

“Real piece of work,” Frank grunts, heading over to the vending machines.

Maya shakes her head to herself, her stomach squirming with excitement just to be talking to him. She takes the assigned key and lays it on the counter for him when he returns from selecting two single beers. With them in hand and then his key, he ducks his head at her and leaves without another word. She watches him go through the windows, once more keeping her eyes on him until she no longer physically can. For the next four hours until one in the morning, her interaction with Frank is the most exciting part of her night. The vending machine full of cigarettes keeps stealing her attention too, her eyes flicking to it every so often.

Tommy chats shit over the radio most of the night, as he’s prone to do if he’s not absorbed in a comic. Sometimes Maya answers, sometimes she don’t. When she’s not resisting the urge to smoke she’s thinking of Frank and his two beers. Surely he’s drank them by now? But then, not everyone needs more than two like her old man.  _Normal_ people just like an odd beer while they watch shitty TV and eat meals for one. Three more hours scrape by and when Fiona finally turns up, Maya could kiss her with relief. She nearly makes it out of the door without caving, but temptation is a bitch and she buys a carton of cigarettes out the machine.

There’s no one to bitch her out either, since Tommy finished his shift two hours ago. The air is wet and damp, but Maya still puts off heading straight back to her trailer by lighting up a cigarette.

“You know that’s a filthy habit.”

Choking, Maya spins around with her hand raised to find Frank Castle walking down the path from his RV, hood up once more against the light rain. Still coughing her lungs up, she gives him the finger as she tries to get herself together. It takes longer than she would like, but she finally catches her breath.

Glaring at Frank, she hisses, “sneakin’ up on tired, caffeine jacked; paranoid women at four am? _Not_ cool.” Her voice is rough from choking on her cigarette smoke and it gives her an added edge of pissed.

Scoffing a laugh, he raises his hands in surrender and Maya notes faded scars there. “Force of habit.” At her raised brow, he adds, “the sneakin’. Not on women. Nah, I actually noticed what time you got off an’ thought,” a jerk of his neck. “Thought I could maybe walk you home. Was comin’ to get a beer, so, y’know.” He shrugs again, tensing his mouth. “Call me old fashioned.”

Raising her cigarette once more, she blows on the soggy spot where rain caught it before she lights it and drags. “’Cause none of that sounded creepier than sneakin’ up on me. Been a while since you talked to a woman, huh?” She exhales on a cloud of smoke, using her free hand to pull the flaps of her leather jacket together.

A sarcastic laugh rumbles through him, his shoulders lifting beneath his damp, black hoodie. “Yeah.”

Maya finds her stomach flipping at the lift of his mouth, at the scrapes hidden in the shadows of his face. The sleeves of his hoodie are pulled up, his forearms showing cuts and bruises. She knows all about his Punishing days, anyone who watched the news knows about those, but Maya wonders what Pete Castiglione gets up to these days. Whatever hobbies he’s indulging in, they certainly seem to be veering closely into Frank Castle’s old life, because the more she looks at him, the more beat up he seems. When she _really_ looks at him? She sees someone looking for the chance to talk, to just make words and move his mouth, to not be in silence. It’s like he wants to ask, but don’t know how.

“Look, Frank,” Maya whispers, dragging once more on her cigarette. “You really wanna walk me home or you wanna hang out? ‘Cause that’s better in your place, not mine.”

“Hey,” Frank answers, shaking his head and looking around. “I ain’t sayin’-”

“I know,” she interrupts. “You want me to grab those beers?”

Clenching his jaw, he shakes his head. “Why don’t you go ahead an’ finish your cancer. Meet you back in a sec, yeah.” Even though all of his words were questions, he poses them in such a way that they become statements, things that are happening, so Maya doesn’t question him.

Nodding, she takes another hearty drag, her skin thrumming and her heart beating faster than normal. If someone had told her about this a few days ago, that she was almost flirting with Frank Castle in the early hours, talking about beers at his place, she would have laughed her ass off. The hell is she doing? But she trusts him and it’s insane, it’s risky but regardless of this _thing_ she has, she’s a woman. As a woman, she’s attracted to this man, she’s attracted to his danger, to his mystery, to his gravel voice. As a woman, this man makes her stomach flip and keep on flipping at that.

She’s pretty sure that Frank isn’t asking for a booty call and she’s not going with him with the full intention of being one, but there’s a little part of her. She can’t lie to herself about that. There is a little part of her that is ready to go there, if he wants to. If it feels right. Jesus. She bites on the filter of her cigarette as she runs her hand through her wild hair. This may be the craziest, most exciting thing that she’s ever done. Turning to watch over her shoulder, she can see Frank exiting the office with another two beers in hand. She finishes her cigarette as he approaches her in the semi-darkness. The way his forearms can be seen under the moonlight does something funny to her insides.

“Ready?” She asks as she tucks her hands into her jacket pockets.

Frank nods, indicating for her to lead the way as he passes her a beer. “You know, I’m not good company. I’m kinda inflictin’ myself upon you.” A small smile curls his mouth at that.

Maya cocks her head with a small smile of her own, cutting her teeth on the cap of her beer. “You feelin’ lonely, Frank?”

As they keep walking through the damp grass, she notes the thin strip of skin between her converse and the edges of her jeans, is steadily getting soaked until she’s lightly trembling. She sips on her beer as she waits for Frank to finish his own mouthful of beer and respond to her.

Swallowing, he laughs, sucking his mouth into a pucker before pursing his lips. “You know you say shit that makes me think you can read my damn mind? What’s that about, huh?” He stops by a tree, reaching out to pick at a bit of bark. “What’s that about, Maya?”

Chewing on the edge of her lip, she cups her elbows and shrugs, tucking her beer under her arm. “I gotta…” she shrugs. “I got a thing.”

“A thing? You gotta thing? Come on,” he urges, swallowing another mouthful. She tries not to stare too hard at his throat working.

“Hmm,” she mumbles under her breath, distracting herself. “Like a… I dunno, a sense, a feeling. Images, sometimes. I dunno. It’s a thing.” She declares by swinging her bottle around before she brings it back to her mouth.

Frank hums under his breath, tapping his fingers against his beer bottle. “A thing,” he repeats.

She sighs, agitatedly tucking her hair behind her ear. “What is this, Frank? What do you want from me?”

Turning his head to face the way they came before he looks at her again, he scoffs. “Nothin.” At her raised brow, he shakes his head, stuffing one hand in his pocket. “Look. People know me, know ‘bout me. They’re trouble, y’know? They’re a shit storm comin’ for me, yeah? Just gotta make sure.”

It’s her turn to scoff into her bottle this time, shaking her head in disbelief. “So this is an interrogation, huh? An’ here’s me thinkin’ you just wanna hang out with me.” The last part is bitter and pulls a serious frown onto Frank’s face. “Forget it. Thanks for the beer.” She toasts him before turning to leave.

“Maya.” Frank bites out behind her as she paces away, downing the last of the beer in her bottle. “Maya!” His hand follows her voice and stops her in her tracks, grip firm.

A shudder rolls through her thinking of his firm touch in a more intimate situation. God, she’s way too attracted to this guy. She gently shakes out of his grip, though she knows for a fact that she only managed it because he allowed it.

“What, Frank? I get it, okay? Suspicious person an’ all that.” She looks him in the eyes, absorbed in how dark they are in the rising sun. “You don’t have to keep up the façade. Just go an’ do whatever it is you’re doing.”

“Maya, look, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to offend you.” He steps back, tapping his beer bottle against his leg. He laughs under his breath. “Forgot how to fuckin’ talk to people, y’know?”

Sighing, she laughs too. “Yeah, I know the feelin’.” Glancing down the path they’ve just walked, she spies Frank’s trailer up ahead. “I know we finished the beer, but we could hang for a little while at your place?”

Keeping his eyes on hers, he looks at her for a long while before he finally nods. “Yeah. Yeah, c’mon.”

They turn and make their way back up to his trailer in silence, listening to birds waking up and watching the sun rise. Maya thinks as they walk up that they’re just going to sit out on the step, but Frank heads up and opens the door, nodding his head inside. With her hands in her pockets after discarding her beer, she jogs her way up after him.

Once inside, she loiters by the door before Frank grunts and flops onto the sofa. “What? I don’t bite,” he mutters at her pointed look. Shrugging, Maya takes the spot next to him since it’s the only available seat. “You wanna drink? Think I got can of somethin’.”

“I’m good, thanks.” Maya answers, tucking her knees up.

Clearing his throat, Frank reaches up to pull his hood back and lean further back into the sofa, turning his head to look at her. “What’s your story, Maya, huh?”

_Why do you intrigue me?_

She doesn’t believe the feeling is her own, though she’s plenty intrigued by the man before her. “Who says I’ve got one?”

Frank tips his head back, face turned to her with a tiny smile. “Come on, y’know allllll ‘bout me,” he sing-songs. “Tell me somethin’ to pass the time.”

The tail end of his voice is sincere, and Maya can’t resist it. “I really don’t have much of one.” She shrugs, twirling a lock of brown hair around her finger. “I been here my whole life. Run this place for my old man soon as I was old enough.”

“Mmhmm,” Frank responds in a low growl. “What’s that pretty scar you got there, huh?” He points his finger at her hip.

Looking down, she finds where her jacket and top have risen, her white scar cuts a jagged line through her olive skin. She hastens to tug it down, clearing her throat. “Was an’ accident from my teens.” After she responds, she frowns, pinning her eyes to Frank’s. “You’re still suspicious of me.”

Laughing, he turns to look at the ceiling, a wary smile on his face. “You’re good at that.”

“Yeah, it’s my thing,” she responds dryly. “Will you drop this shit if I tell you how I got it? An’ you confirm it wasn’t in some messed up life of crime?”

Jerking his chin, he crosses his arms behind his head and turns it to look at her. “Atta girl. I’m all ears, Maya.”

Another shudder runs through her. Both from his arms flexed behind his head, his casual pose; languish body, all stretched out like a meal, and his voice scraping over her name. It shocks her every damn time he says it.

Clearing her throat, she places her elbow against the edge of the sofa and lays her head into her palm. “This thing I got.” She flicks her tongue out to wet her dry lips before she continues. “It’s failed me once. I’d had a drink, I was drivin’, an’ I thought I knew that there wasn’t a car around this blind corner. I was… _convinced_ , y’know? The way I feel when I have these intuitions.” 

Mumbling under his breath to confirm he’s listening, Frank keeps his languish pose up, his hoodie slightly rising and falling with each of his even breaths.

Maya flexes her fingers into her hair, rubbing her nails along her scalp in agitation as she continues her story. “I was just drunk though, kiddin’ myself. I crashed. Obviously. No one was hurt in the other car, thank God, but I got this.” She waves at her hip. “An’ a few other pretty ones,” she finishes sarcastically.

“You get in trouble?” Frank grumbles lowly, shifting his feet against the runner of the RV. “Do any time?”

Maya shakes her head. “Christ, no. I got in trouble though. Lost my license. Got a hefty fine. Community service.”

“Lucked out, huh?” He murmurs, still looking at her.

Scoffing, she sits forward and places her chin on her bent up knees. “I should have done time. I was stupid.”

“Ah, you were young,” Frank dismisses, turning his head to the ceiling and back to her. “We all make mistakes.”

“Did you make mistakes, Frank?” She finds herself blurting out. “Do you regret any of it?”

There’s a breathless second between them, and then the rustle of Frank sitting up and hunching over his knees. She stares at him, tense through to her bones and more so when he turns to look at her. “Not one second of it.”

“I’m sorry you lost em’, Frank,” she whispers softly.

He nods sharply, clutching his hands and staring at them with eyes growing darker. “Yeah. Yeah, me too.”

* * *

When Maya opens her eyes the next day, her first thoughts are of leaving Frank’s RV last night, or this morning, depending on how one looks at it. They talked for hours, about nothing and everything, about shit. It was unlike any conversation she’s ever had with another person in her life. It was exciting and full of banter at times, and then serious in the next breath. Crashing through subjects and talking over each other, laughing through their noses. Of course, there was a lot of the time spent watching him too, looking at him, admiring him. Wishing some part of him was feeling the same about her.

It’s wildly terrifying how much she likes him in such a short amount of time, but she does and she can’t deny that to anyone, least of all herself. Frank is a man who talks and talks but doesn’t actually _say_ anything, and it leaves her wanting more constantly. Obsessing over him throughout her daily routine, throughout the minutes that turn into hours. Technically, it’s her day off but she’s dealing with the books for most of the morning and she's still not done with them by the afternoon. By that point, she’s smoked through her whole pack of cigarettes and decides to go and buy more. It’s a little sunnier today but still damp for the most part, frizzing her hair beyond a joke.

At the office, Georgia is on shift and they exchange idle chit chat while Maya purchases her cigarettes. “Oh, forgot to say, some guy was lookin’ for you.”

Freezing for a second, she hurries out, “Pete?”

“Yeah, that’s him! Tall, dark an’ handsome. He your guy?” Georgia coos, leaning over the counter as if she’s in for some juicy gossip.

Maya snorts at her blonde colleague. “Fr- Pete’s not anyone’s guy.”

“Well, he sounded hot for you honey,” the other girl giggles.

Refusing to indulge in that particular fantasy, Maya shrugs it off and proffers her pack of cigarettes. “Well, I got what I came for. See you, Georgia.”

“Say hi to Mr Hunk for me, won’t you?” The other girl’s voices follows her out.

Shaking her head, Maya mutters, “Christ,” under her breath as she unwraps her cigarettes, walking blindly through the trees and down the path back to her trailer.

“Didn’t I tell you that’s a filthy habit?”

Jumping out of her skin, she looks up with a cigarette pinched between her fingers to find Frank casually leaning against a tree. “Not unless you give me heart attack first. Dude.” She rubs her chest dramatically, just to watch his cheek twitch into a laugh.

“Real piece of work,” he mutters back. “Day off?”

“Stalkin’ me, Castle?” She throws back, filter between her teeth as she retrieves her lighter.

“Ooh, I in trouble there, Maya?” Frank answers, watching her keenly light up and take a drag.

Smirking at the excitement in her stomach, she pockets her lighter and begins to walk with no destination in mind, throwing over her shoulder, “thought you were leaving? You know I’m gonna have to charge double if you want a late notice bookin’.”

The sounds of his footsteps and his voice follow behind her as she smokes her cigarette steadily to the filter. “Christ. Y’know I would’ve been gone if I weren’t up all night.”

“Oh, right. Lucky girl.” A shameless bit of flirtation slips out and she has to throw her head back to see his reaction, tapping the accumulation of ash to the ground.

He comes to a halt behind her, tilting his chin back a little. “You walk back to my RV on purpose, Maya?”

Glancing to her side, she finds she has in fact walked right the way back to where he’s staying. A flush stains her cheeks as she looks back to him. “Frank…”

“Come on,” he interrupts her, heading up the stairs. “I got nowhere to be.”

“Don’t lie to me, Castle.” She flicks her half smoked cigarette away and follows up after him, smiling at his hearty laugh.

“You got the thing. Right.” He chuckles again as he walks into the tiny kitchen and pops open the mini fridge.

“When did you stock up?” Maya asks in surprise as he hands her a beer.

Glancing at her, he stares for a second before retrieving his own beer. “Always had ‘em. Needed an’ excuse to suss you out.”

“Jesus,” she laughs, taking the cap off her bottle. “An’ I’m the piece of work?” She adds as she steps forward and puts the cap on the side, raising the bottle to her mouth.

Frank takes his own swig and steps into her space, causing the very breath to seize in her chest. “Oh yeah. I see that in you, Maya. I see it real well.” For the longest time she doesn’t know what the hell to say. They continue to stare at each other, sharing the same oxygen, her watching keenly as Frank licks his bottom lip. “Y’know, I ain’t really done this in a while, Maya.” He breaks the silence in a whisper, shaking his head and looking at her up under his lashes. “I don’t ev-”

“Shut up, Frank,” she whispers back, reaching up to cup the back of his head. “Just... shut up.” With that, she pulls his head down to kiss her.

They both hasten to get their bottles on the side as they attack each other’s mouths, Frank’s hands reaching up to grip her hair in a tight fist. “Christ, your hair is fuckin’ amazin’,” he grunts against her lips.

Maya grunts back, hurrying to undo his belt buckle as he tugs at her jacket. They're a mess of hands, blurring body parts moving erratically as they strip each other’s clothes off. They don’t even make it to the bedroom, least of all a bed. Instead they fall against the scrappy sofa, both naked as the day they were born. Frank’s teeth bite at her bottom lip as he slips his fingers between her legs, playing in the mess of juices there until she’s panting into his mouth.

Against her mouth, he mutters, “don’t have a r-”

“Birth control,” Maya bites out impatiently, raising her legs to wrap around his waist. “I’m ready, Frank.”

Head falling into her shoulder, his hand reaches down to line up his cock to her dripping wet cunt. “Atta girl.”

A shudder rolls through her, punching out a moan as he begins to push into her tight, hot inner folds. “Jesus, Frank.” Her nails dig into his shoulders, her mouth kissing scars there.

“Easy,” he croons back, in no rush. “Easy, we got all day.”

All day… how long past that, though? Maya knows he’s not going to stick around, knows he won’t stop moving for her, for this. So she decides to enjoy every single moment. Every heated breath, every moan and shudder, every wave of pleasure coursing through her. Clutches him tight as he fucks into her, clutches her, and squeezes her.

After, when they’ve satisfied themselves, she lays with her head on his chest, sprawled on the sofa and still nude. A part of her wants to be sad, but she pushes it away and forces a smile on her face. “It was nice gettin’ to know you, Frank.”

A tired chuckle presses past his lips, his fingers playing through her hair as she turns her head to kiss his chest. “Real piece of work.”

Giggling, Maya’s grin spreads wide across her face. “You too, Castle. You too.”


End file.
